Strawbery Banke- Thanksgiving Throughout The Ages

On Monday, we hopped on a bus for our first field trip of the year and headed to Strawbery Banke! 

We visited Strawbery Banke to learn about the Thanksgiving traditions that have existed in our community for hundreds of years. We visited seven different stations to learn about how the holiday was celebrated over time as well as about similar holidays that are celebrated in countries all around the world. 

Before hopping into our first time machine, we completed a venn diagram of Thanksgiving traditions from 1777 to 2017, and we saw that many traditions are still the same. While we still cook up a big meal today, the way we prepare our meal is very different! But we still celebrate with our friends and family and remember all that we have to be thankful for. 

We traveled back in time to an early Thanksgiving celebration at the Fraser Pitt Tavern in the 1700s, where we learned how to make corn husk dolls. Early settlers in the U.S. learned how to utilize all parts of their crops and game from the Native Americans, who joined the settlers for their Thanksgiving feasts

We got to try some of the different kitchen tools/preserving methods they had available in the 1700s such as a grinder for spices, scales for measuring ingredients, stringing beans to dry for winter, and mortars and pestles for making indian meal out of dried corn kernels

We then got to travel to the 1800s to meet Mrs. Goodwin, who told us that Sarah Josepha Hale, a New Hampshire native, was the person responsible for helping to make Thanksgiving a national holiday-- she had to ask five different presidents before one finally agreed. Abraham Lincoln made it official in 1863, and he declared the 4th Thursday of every month to be Thanksgiving in all the United States. Ms. Hale wanted Thanksgiving to be on the same day, so families from different states could come together to celebrate and have more time to prepare for the festivities. Before Abraham Lincoln agreed to make it so during his presidency, all states celebrated Thanksgiving on a different Thursday of the year, and they only got four days' notice to prepare! 

After Mrs. Goodwin gave us a tour of her home, we helped her make charity baskets for families in need. Families who did not have the means to prepare a Thanksgiving meal would go around from house with a pillow case to house to collect supplies for their feast. They would add wild rice, Indian meal (corn meal), flour, sugar, raisins, apples, a piece of meat, and baked goods to the bags along with knitted items to help those who were less fortunate.

 We also traveled to the year 1919 and visited the Shapiro house to learn about holidays similar to Thanksgiving that are celebrated around the world with feasts and festivals. While Mrs. Shapiro celebrated Thanksgiving with her family after immigrating to America, they incorporate a lot of different traditions from their culture in the Ukraine into this harvest feast. While she also prepared things like pumpkin pie and a turkey, she also cooked matzo ball soup to have with their Thanksgiving meal! 

We also learned the names and traditions of other harvest festivals celebrated around the world. In Israel, they celebrate Sukkot, which is an autumn harvest festival celebrating the sheltering of the Israelites. In Germany they celebrate St. Martin's Day with a feast, and in China they have their Moon Festival.  In Ghana, they have their Yam Festival and in India, they celebrate Pongal. Some of the giraffes have even celebrated some of these other harvest holidays with their own families! 

We learned so much from the docents and role players at Strawbery Banke. We are so grateful for all of your help with making this wonderful learning experience possible. We hope the giraffes will return to Strawbery Banke soon so they can share their learning with their families!